Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 11:31     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
Anonymous wrote:He sounds like a narcissist.


+1. A narcissist who gets away with it and even thrives because he is a man. Selfish men always get away with being selfish.
Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 10:21     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:My Dad left my mother for his affair partner after 16 years of marriage; my sister and I were 12 and 14 respectively. He had sold our family home and moved all of us to another state for his job, then decided he wanted to be with AP, who had a toddler at the time. My mom took my sister and I back to our home city, Dad moved AP and the toddler to the new city, and that was that. Needless to say, it scarred us all. My sister and I are both successful and I'm a SMBC, but neither of us got married. I think we never recovered from the mushroom cloud of what happened in our early adolescence.

We've stayed close with my Dad (AP died of cancer and Dad remarried again), but as I've gotten older and become a parent myself, I find his choices during my childhood to be breathtakingly selfish. We never lived in the same city with him again. We saw him for summers and holidays, and that was pretty much it. This was compounded when he recently compounded his life story into a book and sent copies to my sister and I (and also my mother!). He devoted a single paragraph to the divorce and our resulting family split, including noting how much I "lambasted" him (his word) over the phone about the divorce during this time. Well, yes. I was a 12 yo girl who's Dad left their family for another woman and child. I was devastated.

My Dad now wants to talk about all of this, is querying my sister and I if we've "read his book". What makes me sad is that it's full of other great stories...he's had an interesting, successful life. I'm glad to have his personal history written down and it will be meaningful when he passes away. But I had to work hard to make peace with what happened during my childhood, and seeing in black and white how easily he justified his behavior gutted me.

I thought I had closed this wound, and I'm not looking for beef with my 79 yo father. It's so hard when people we love let us down.


what is a SMBC?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturday_Morning_Breakfast_Cereal


Single Mother By Choice
Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 08:12     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I would write that chapter from your perspective OP. Not to send it to him or anything, just to append it to the book for your kid.


This. And then offer it to some newspaper as an opinion column or publish it yourself on social media. Sounds like your father is famous enough that he wrote a memoir and expects people to buy it. Put all the dirt down and have at it. You can entitle it "A child's view of my pompous dad's {name} life choices". The only thing that takes such people down a peg or two is if OTHER people actually get to know the real them, not the picture-perfect polished version that they've built of themselves for so long.
I agree with prior posts. Write that chapter from your perspective and append it to the book for your child or publish it in opinion column or social media.

I experience something similar from my MIL. A few years after my DH passed away from an illness, she sends me a self published memoir. In it, she makes a thinly veiled criticism about me. It was so unexpected, like it came out of left field. But I have no need to hash out with her. She’s burned that bridge with me.
Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 07:38     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
What a narcissist. I’m amazed you stayed close with him when he just walked out on you all. Glad you lambasted him.
Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 06:12     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
Anonymous wrote:My Dad left my mother for his affair partner after 16 years of marriage; my sister and I were 12 and 14 respectively. He had sold our family home and moved all of us to another state for his job, then decided he wanted to be with AP, who had a toddler at the time. My mom took my sister and I back to our home city, Dad moved AP and the toddler to the new city, and that was that. Needless to say, it scarred us all. My sister and I are both successful and I'm a SMBC, but neither of us got married. I think we never recovered from the mushroom cloud of what happened in our early adolescence.

We've stayed close with my Dad (AP died of cancer and Dad remarried again), but as I've gotten older and become a parent myself, I find his choices during my childhood to be breathtakingly selfish. We never lived in the same city with him again. We saw him for summers and holidays, and that was pretty much it. This was compounded when he recently compounded his life story into a book and sent copies to my sister and I (and also my mother!). He devoted a single paragraph to the divorce and our resulting family split, including noting how much I "lambasted" him (his word) over the phone about the divorce during this time. Well, yes. I was a 12 yo girl who's Dad left their family for another woman and child. I was devastated.

My Dad now wants to talk about all of this, is querying my sister and I if we've "read his book". What makes me sad is that it's full of other great stories...he's had an interesting, successful life. I'm glad to have his personal history written down and it will be meaningful when he passes away. But I had to work hard to make peace with what happened during my childhood, and seeing in black and white how easily he justified his behavior gutted me.

I thought I had closed this wound, and I'm not looking for beef with my 79 yo father. It's so hard when people we love let us down.


what is a SMBC?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturday_Morning_Breakfast_Cereal
Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 05:09     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
OP I come from a family of writers and journalists, and it is truly a right of passage for the men in our family to write their memoirs and leave such an unhinged version of history behind that it makes me want to scream until my teeth fall out or something. In certain circles, this is deeply typical and continues the generational sidelining of the truth in order to support these old men’s fragile egos. This is painful, but I am with you and it’s very typical.

The only thing I can say is that in my experience, they get there comeuppance when their brilliant memoirs get shopped to their previous publishing houses and dismissed out of hand because they are not that interesting, vulnerable, or compelling. So it ends up being just a long journal entry. Had these men journaled through their actual nuclear bombs perhaps they would have more insight.
Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 01:39     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:You're right. He was selfish. I'm glad you lambasted him. He deserved it.


Lol thanks. I mean...I was a kid. Jesus. And I was hurting. Like what did he expect? I knew I'd lost a parent. His description of getting together with the AP-turned-stepmom was just as bad. "I met Larla, and well, the rest is history".

What I wish is that he'd written down whatever version made sense to him, and just kept it to himself. To think he sent this to my mother is pretty unreal.

If this were all there was to him, it would have been easy to shut him out of my life. But he supported me in many other ways, including funding college and taking interest in my sister and I as adults. There was so many mixed messages that honestly, I never really felt like I could trust men. It was a terrible place to land emotionally.


You should write this to him in a letter


I thought about that. I'm just not sure what it would accomplish. I think as people age they become somewhat calcified in their recollection of their lives and the version in which they're comfortable. That's what I think my Dad did here; he wrote the story where he's not the bad guy. I don't think I'd have much success in dissuading him from that perspective, and I fear what the cost would be. This too is the legacy of him leaving the first time. It's cemented a fear that if I pushed too hard, he'd do it again.

I just wish this chapter had stayed closed.

I don't know if he is a good writer, but you are. Why not write about your experience from childhood through receiving the book? Write from your perspective about your experience and your feelings. Don't discuss him/his motives/your opinion of why and what he did. Discuss facts. Discuss his actions and choices and how they impacted you and what you witnessed your mother and sister go through. I would read your book.



Yes! YOU matter, YOUR story is your truth. Let him hear from you how his choices gratly affected your childhood and your life. I think he is asking for it-- give it to him!
Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 01:27     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:You're right. He was selfish. I'm glad you lambasted him. He deserved it.


Lol thanks. I mean...I was a kid. Jesus. And I was hurting. Like what did he expect? I knew I'd lost a parent. His description of getting together with the AP-turned-stepmom was just as bad. "I met Larla, and well, the rest is history".

What I wish is that he'd written down whatever version made sense to him, and just kept it to himself. To think he sent this to my mother is pretty unreal.

If this were all there was to him, it would have been easy to shut him out of my life. But he supported me in many other ways, including funding college and taking interest in my sister and I as adults. There was so many mixed messages that honestly, I never really felt like I could trust men. It was a terrible place to land emotionally.


You should write this to him in a letter


I thought about that. I'm just not sure what it would accomplish. I think as people age they become somewhat calcified in their recollection of their lives and the version in which they're comfortable. That's what I think my Dad did here; he wrote the story where he's not the bad guy. I don't think I'd have much success in dissuading him from that perspective, and I fear what the cost would be. This too is the legacy of him leaving the first time. It's cemented a fear that if I pushed too hard, he'd do it again.

I just wish this chapter had stayed closed.


Op, you are right. You want it closed and keep it that way. The advantage you have now is you are an adult. So, be blunt, what is done is done. Not sure why your father wants to rehash the whole thing.
Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 01:19     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I would write that chapter from your perspective OP. Not to send it to him or anything, just to append it to the book for your kid.


Actually, definitely to send to him!


Write it but have someone proofread it. Your grammar in OP is not good.
Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 01:15     Subject: Re:Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
I suspect the AP’s toddler was his child? Your poor mom…
Anonymous
Post 03/22/2025 01:08     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
Anonymous wrote:He sounds like a narcissist.

Nah. Sounds like a typical selfish person.
Anonymous
Post 03/21/2025 23:28     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
OMG! The nerve to send a copy to OP’s mom. I’d think that dad had lost his marbles.
Anonymous
Post 03/21/2025 17:29     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
OP my mom is similar to this. She didn't have an affair and destroy the family in such a cruel way, but she would have massive mental blow ups all throughout our childhood and always keep us off kilter, and now, in her 80s, likes to talk about what a great job she did raising us. She is the master at rewriting history and it's so unbelievable to hear her take. Literally no basis in reality, with her the hero of every story. Last time I visited I saw a notebook full of stories she's telling about her life, and damn, pure fiction where it comes to our childhood. If I got an actual book on that I would not take it with the grace you're showing.

I'm sorry he did that to you, then and now.
Anonymous
Post 03/21/2025 15:04     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
Anonymous wrote:He sounds like a narcissist.


+1

Writing and sending you a book of his personal autobiography is a big clue!
Anonymous
Post 03/21/2025 15:01     Subject: Read my Dad's memoir; description of my childhood was a gut punch
Anonymous wrote:I would write that chapter from your perspective OP. Not to send it to him or anything, just to append it to the book for your kid.


This. And then offer it to some newspaper as an opinion column or publish it yourself on social media. Sounds like your father is famous enough that he wrote a memoir and expects people to buy it. Put all the dirt down and have at it. You can entitle it "A child's view of my pompous dad's {name} life choices". The only thing that takes such people down a peg or two is if OTHER people actually get to know the real them, not the picture-perfect polished version that they've built of themselves for so long.